


Debts Repaid

by LookingForDroids



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Canonverse (mostly), Deeply screwed up children, Friendship, Gen, Gen Work, Revenge, Serial Killers, mentions of child abuse, morbid and creepifying
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-20
Updated: 2014-08-20
Packaged: 2018-02-14 01:12:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,629
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2172324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LookingForDroids/pseuds/LookingForDroids
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rescuing Mikasa from the bandits was not the first time Eren has killed, or the last. In fact, faced with a cruel world, a father's encouragement, and a head full of violent impulses he doesn't entirely understand, Eren is more than willing to take justice into his own hands.</p><p>Which is to say: Eren Jaeger, prepubescent vigilante serial killer AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Debts Repaid

**Author's Note:**

> Written for this prompt at the kink meme: http://snkkink.dreamwidth.org/13546.html?thread=9111786#cmt9111786

By the time Eren realizes he shouldn't have taken the shortcut home, it's already too late. It's getting darker, and the bag full of vegetables is heavy on his arm, and nothing in this part of town looks familiar or safe. There are taverns that line the streets, dimly lit and soot-blackened, and nameless establishments with red lanterns hanging in the windows, and he just wants to get out of here and find his way back to somewhere he belongs.

Worse yet, there's someone trailing him. He thought it was nothing, at first, but whoever it is has been following him for the past three streets, and he isn't stupid. He knows when something is wrong.

A quick look behind his shoulder reveals a heavyset bearded man, over twice his height and dressed in rough leathers, definitely watching him. Eren picks up his pace, trying not to panic. He's heard about the things that happen to kids that get caught in the bad parts of town alone. Slavery and worse, even if he isn't exactly clear on what the _worse_ entails, and he slips the small knife at his belt free from its scabbard, clutching it tightly. He's never used a knife before, never tried to hurt anyone, but the weight of it in his hand is a comfort.

 _It's dangerous out there,_ his father says. _You always need to carry a weapon_.

He speeds up, and hears the footsteps behind him increase apace. Not a mistake, then, no misunderstanding. He looks back again, sees the bearded man gaining ground, and then he's running, his pulse beating in his ears. He's fast, but he's not fast enough, and his pursuer makes one long stride for every two of his. It's only a matter of time before he's caught.

The man grabs him from behind, and Eren twists in that heavy grip, struggles, swings the knife upward. It connects with a solid _thunk_ , sinks deep, and he sees the man's eyes grow wide as he doubles over, clutching his belly as Eren pulls the knife free. There's blood, red and wet all over his hands, and he's he's breathing hard, his heart pounding with fear and -

He needs to get away, find somewhere safe. He needs to find a doctor, try to keep the man from dying. But he doesn't do either of those things. He shifts his grip on the knife and slashes higher, and when he opens the man's throat, it isn't anything like conscious thought that drives him.

It's fear, partly. Fear and anger, instinct, the impulse to survive, but beneath all of that, there's a savage, terrible exhilaration. He swings the knife again with a wordless snarl, even after the bastard collapses in a spray of arterial blood, and again, stabbing at the chest, the stomach. Again. _Again._

And then it's over, and it's quiet, and he's thinking clearly, or almost clearly. There's blood soaking his shirt, and a spreading pool of it at his feet. It's enticing, almost, and he reaches unconsciously for the corpse before his mind catches up to him and he jerks back, shuddering, uncertain what he had been meaning to do. He ought to be scared. He ought to be sick. He _is_ scared and sick, staring down at the lump of cooling meat that used to be a person, and guilt sits heavy in the pit of his stomach. But he can't forget the way it felt, the slight give as metal parted flesh, the ease of it. He can't forget that he liked it.

He runs. He doesn't look back, forgets his shopping discarded in some back alley, barely remembers to hold on to the knife. He can feel tears streaking his face, and if he stops he'll have time to think about it, what he did and what he wants to do, so instead he just keeps on running until he's back on familiar streets, and doesn't stop until he's all the way home.

His father is there, reading on the porch in a pool of lamplight like there's nothing wrong at all, and guilt hits Eren again, all in a wave. He wants to hide, and never show his face again, but he doesn't. He keeps on going, right up the path to the house, and he tells himself that he doesn't have to worry, because Dr. Jaeger always knows how to make everything better.

"It's all right," Eren's father says, scooping Eren up into strong arms. "It's all right, you can tell me what happened." He murmurs soothing things, pried the bloodstained knife from Eren's fingers and promises that he won't be angry.

_Shhh. It's all right. You can tell me._

And Eren leans against his father's chest, fighting through hiccuping sobs, and after a long time, he does.

~

Eren's father talks to him about it again that evening, after dinner, while his mother is out tending the garden. He ruffles Eren's hair, pours him a cup of steaming hot tea with honey in his favorite mug, and says "you need to understand, it's natural, what you feel."

Eren looks down at his now-clean hands, shame heating his face, and tries not to think about what he feels. "Isn't it wrong, though? Murder?"

"For most people, certainly," his father says gently. "But you're not most people. Your needs are different."

"My needs?" Eren says, confused. "I don't..."

His father squeezes his hand, reassuring, and Eren can't help but feel a little better. "It's wrong to kill innocents, of course. But not everybody is innocent, now, are they?"

And Eren - well, he's heard the stories, seen the things kids his age aren't supposed to know about. He knows about corruption, and lawlessness. Slavery and worse, and the men and women, the children younger than he is, who show up at his father's door at odd hours with mysterious contusions, broken bones and no money to pay. He knows not everybody is innocent.

He can't deny that his father is right.

~

After that, there are other stories, other memories to go along with them. A window cracked open, the flash of a blade in the dark, and that timid boy Jochen doesn't have to wear his sleeves long to hide burns and bruises any longer. A pimp followed down a filthy alley, a leap from behind and hands closing about the throat.

Not often. He never does it often. And after Mikasa, after the bandits in the cavern, his father says he needs to be careful - _they won't understand you, Eren, you can't let them know._ He can't even let his mother know, though he wishes he could tell her the truth, if only so she could know that he's strong enough to keep his family safe. But there are always people who need to die, just like he needs the knife in his hands and the smell of blood thick and heavy in the air, just like he needs -

_You're different, my boy. You're special._

~

He never does it often. But sometimes...

~

They're coming back late from errands in town, him and Mikasa, both of them with parcels in their arms and trying to outrace the oncoming nightfall, when some leering piece of human excrement with whiskey on his breath lurches out of a doorway and makes a grab for Mikasa. Eren doesn't have to protect her, this time or ever. She throws the assailant herself, just shifts her center of gravity and sends him flying on his own momentum. But it's Eren who turns back to look at him as Mikasa retrieves her packages, fixing the image in his mind, memorizing the face. Eren who smiles at him through the anger - or bares teeth, at least - and curls his fingers around the hilt of an imaginary blade, because Mikasa shouldn't ever have to be in danger again.

A week later, and the talk is all over the district.

 _Drowned in a goddamn bathhouse,_ Eren hears, and _not just drowned, I heard. You know he was missing three fingers?_

_Well, he was a nasty piece of work. Made his share of enemies, didn't he?_

_Delinquent on his debts, is what I heard._

Eren remembers that bathhouse, the rising steam and the watery red circling the drain, and he thinks about family, and debts, and figures the talk in town isn't fully wrong. He runs a thumb over the three small bones in his pocket, smooth now and stripped clean of flesh, and this time there's barely any shame remaining.

~

He knows his father is proud of him, for doing the right thing. For doing what needs to be done.

~

 _That poor boy,_ a woman says at market, while Eren is sorting through bolts of cloth, spools of ribbon, looking for a gift for his mother. _A wild dog did it, they're saying._

 _Wild dog or worse,_ her companion says. _Whatever did it needs to be put down._

"Ugly business, that," the man behind the counter says, when he sees Eren listening. "But nothing you need to worry about. You shouldn't pay no mind to it."

Eren nods in agreement, but can't stop himself from muttering "wasn't any worse than what he tried to do to Armin."

The shopkeeper frowns, fine lines creasing between his eyebrows, and Eren turns his attention back to the lace he's considering. It's fine stuff, even Eren can recognize that, delicate and intricate as ice on glass. Finer than anything usually sold in Shinganshina. His mother will love it.

That's what he really cares about, mostly. Making his family happy.

~

It's Armin who catches up to him outside the store, falls into step beside him, falls silent after a subdued "hello." Preoccupied with something. Eren hopes nobody else has tried to hurt him, though he can't quite still a shiver of anticipation at the thought of someone else who needs to be hunted down and made to pay. Armin glances at him from time to time, and then rapidly away, eyes settling anywhere but Eren's face. He pulls Eren aside when there's no one else in sight, and he's nervous, resolute as a prisoner facing execution, and it's suddenly, acutely clear that what's bothering him isn't some nameless outside threat. It's Eren himself.

"Eren," Armin says, "can we talk somewhere? Alone?"

 _He's scared,_ Eren thinks. Shallow breath, pale skin, sweat on palms and forehead. He's used to fear by now, but he never wanted Armin to be scared of him.

"Yeah," he says. "Sounds like a good idea." He lets Armin lead the way to their quiet spot by the river, the place where the three of them always go when they need somewhere to be alone, and he digs his fingernails into his palms and tries not to lose his cool. For the first time in years, he's scared enough to feel his breath tight in his chest, hit with the realization that he's on the verge of losing something that means more to him than almost anything else. _Armin's smart,_ , he thinks with a surge of pride. _He makes connections. Of course he would figure it out._ And it isn't difficult to guess what Armin's going to say next, but it's still a shock to hear it spoken aloud.

"Why did you do it?"

"Because he deserved it," Eren says. He can feel his hands clenching into fists, rage rising again in memory, and he knows he would do it again if he could. People always think Armin makes an easy target. Someone needs to show them different. "Because assholes who do things like that don't deserve to live."

"So you..." Armin says slowly, calmly, piecing it together. "You made it look like an animal did it. So you wouldn't get caught."

"That's right," Eren says. "That's what I did." He isn't trying to lie to Armin, but he can still almost taste the blood in the back of his throat, and he can't shake the feeling that that's what he's doing anyway. Armin watches him carefully, like he knows there's something else going on, just beneath the surface, and all of a sudden, Eren isn't angry anymore. He's tired.

"I'm sorry," he says. "I don't wanna scare you. I don't wanna hurt anyone who doesn't deserve it. It's just, I'm..."

He doesn't know what to say, how to explain it in a way that will make Armin understand, so in the end he just looks down, shoulders slumping, and says "I'm different."

Armin doesn't ask how he's different. He's quick enough, maybe he doesn't need to. Maybe he's figured it out somehow already, knows better than Eren what makes Eren the way he is, or maybe he just doesn't care.

"How long?" he asks instead, almost whispering.

"Since I was little," Eren says, and Armin flinches a little, recovers quickly, never looks away.

"Only the bad guys, though," Eren says, and he's suddenly desperate for Armin to believe it. "Only the ones who hurt people."

"Like the one who tried to hurt me."

"Yeah."

They fall silent again, nothing but the sound of waves and the cries of gulls, nothing to distract them. Eren watches a white cloud scudding by overhead, decides it looks kind of like a dragon, or maybe a winged horse. Some fierce, proud beast, anyway, something dangerous - Armin would know better what to call it. He's always been the best at figuring out what things are supposed to be, and what they really are. Eren's probably an idiot, to hope that he and Armin will ever look for pictures in clouds together again.

"I won't tell anyone," Armin says, after a long time. "I swear I won't."

"I wouldn't do anything to you, you know. If you did."

"You're my friend," Armin says, like that's never been in question. And Eren figures that it's just the lead-up to goodbye, because he's not stupid and Armin's not stupid, and both of them, now, know the truth. It's all right, though. Eren isn't going to stop protecting him even if they aren't friends anymore. But what Armin does is just smile slightly, like he's made some sort of decision that he doesn't regret, and what he says is "that's all that really matters, you know."

~

Mikasa doesn't say anything at all, when they tell her. She just lifts her chin a little, grabs Eren's hand and threads her fingers through his and doesn't let go, but then, she's family, and ever since the day with the bandits she's been a killer too.

She doesn't say anything when they tell her, but later that night, after lights out, she sites perched on the edge of his bed and tells him about the time she saw a preying mantis devour a butterfly, and how sometimes she hates people too. Her voice is cool, unaffected, but there's anger running hot beneath the surface, and it isn't aimed in his direction. Eren thinks about steel sliding through skin and blood crusted beneath his nails, the taste of it, the boy they say was mauled by an animal. He wonders if she'd still see him the same way, if she knew everything. Maybe so. There are shadows on her face and in her eyes, and her hair hangs down over her shoulders like a mourner's veil, and Eren wishes he could bring back everything she's lost, but even Dr. Jaeger can't do that. So instead, he lifts up the loose floorboard beside his bed and shows her the small box he keeps there, with three tiny bones instide, and tells her "this one was for you."

"Next time," she says, and takes the box from his hands, holds it carefully, like something precious and easily broken. "Next time, I want to be there."


End file.
